Hideki Matsui hit a triple last night for the first time since April of last season and Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Registerwrites that it may have cost Torii Hunter a whole bunch of money.According to Plunkett the two players “had a friendly wager” on whether Matsui and his arthritic knees could leg out a triple this season, and “the wager was definitely not for any amount of money like, oh, $5,000.”
In other words, it was for $5,000. Here’s what Hunter had to say afterward:

I was like, “What the …? Ah, hell no.” I’m not talking to Matsui anymore. I saw him running the bases. He was making all kinds of faces, trying to get me. I didn’t realize it was a triple until I got to the dugout then everybody let me know.

Matsui ought to go double or nothing on Hunter hitting a triple. Hunter has zero in 135 games after hitting just one in 119 games last season.

It has EVERYTHING to do with betting on baseball. It could affect the outcome of a game. Matsui could run into an out to win the bet trying to turn a double into a triple – or hold up on a possible inside the park homerun. Teams aren’t even allowed to have performance-stat related contract incentives for that very reason.

See, Pete! You should have told everybody they were just ‘friendly wagers’ between you and your mobster buddies and everyone would have just laughed it off and you would be in the HoF….
Betting is betting, plain and simple, no matter what you call it. I would hope MLB looks into this.